


Pedals and Parking Lots

by Prosodi



Category: Half Moon Investigations
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-10
Updated: 2012-02-10
Packaged: 2017-10-30 21:27:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/336347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prosodi/pseuds/Prosodi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Red teaches Fletcher how to drive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pedals and Parking Lots

The gears of the car grind and pop horribly. Fletcher is sure he is going to have whiplash by the end of the day, but he can't do anything to stop it - his feet are somehow physically incapable of working at the right rhythm. Every time he releases the clutch and applies the gas on the Mercedes it hops a few feet down the road before he manages to work it into gear and putter along for a few meters. In the passenger seat, Red is sweating and gripping the dashboard. He is probably trying to estimate how he's going to explain to his gather how he ruined the gears on a car he knows how to drive perfectly well.

'Easy, easy,' he says, knuckles white. He then swears quite a lot when the car grunts forward.

Fletcher winces. Driving is important for any good detective - being able to jump in a car and speed off is integral to the kind of investigations they're on now. Biking after a suspect often doesn't cut it. Fletcher has never been good at running. Have reliable, quick transportation has always made sense to him. It's why he started saving for a car when he turned fourteen. What he didn't put much thought into was learning how to drive one. Steering is fine, but the pedal mechanism is a nightmare. 'Just save for an automatic,' his father said kindly after a fortnight of trying to teach him manual. Which, sure there's that - but that's also missing the point entirely. He has to be prepared for anything. 

The car stumbles and stalls on the roadside. The engine clicks. Fletcher tries to start it again, but nothing happens until he realizes--

'Other pedal,' Red tells him.

Fletcher swears softly and flushes red. 'It's fine, I don't need to learn. You can just do all the driving.'

It's a joke. Mostly. But he's also angry at himself. This should be straightforward. It's just a matter of observation and timing: gently letting out the clutch and applying the gas in the same increments, listening to the purr of the engine's rpms and swapping the pedals at the right moment. Knowing when to shift gears. Remembering to jam the heavy clutch in before the car stops completely. It's a lot, but it should be easy. Plenty of people know how to drive a manual car.

'Clutch in,' Red barks at him. He bangs his fist on the dashboard and something about his flagrant abuse of his father's expensive car puts Fletcher's mind marginally at ease. He puts in the clutch in.

Red patiently walks him through it in a series of steps. 'Gentle gas, ease out clutch - less gas. More clutch. Less clutch. More gas,' he says, a plodding rhythmic mantra that guides the Mercedes jumping and hitching into first gear. It wheels across the empty parking lot. Fletcher steers a little wildly around the empty bins. 'Alright slow down,' Red says as they approach the edge of the parking lot. Fletcher lets off the gas and fumbles for the brake. 'Brake,' Red says, and again: 'Brake now.'

He doesn't brake. Instead he just steers the Mercedes in a huge, roaring circle. Red slides around in the passenger seat, scrabbling at the dashboard and clutching at the divider. 'Brake!' he shouts.

Fletcher slams the brake. The tires shriek. The engine stalls. The Mercedes crow hops forward.

Whiplash, Fletcher thinks. They're going to be sitting in their respective beds with neck braces for the next week. He has visions of going to school like that, or trying to tackle a suspect like that.

Red peels himself off the dashboard and points down between Fletcher's feet. 'That's the brake, you idiot!' he shouts.

'Yes, I can see that!' Fletcher shouts back at him.

Red slams his hand down over top Fletcher's on the gear shift with more then unreasonable force. 'Clutch in,' he says. Steely and irritable, Fletcher jams the clutch down to the floor with a hollow bang. Red pulls the gear shaft down out of first, swaying it easily in the neutral position for a moment before he pushes Fletcher's hand - pops the car back into first gear. 'Alright, slowly this time. I'm taking snail crawl. Old ladies should be outrunning this car, Half-Moon.'

Fletcher eases the clutch out, nudges the gas in. The Mercedes gives a little hitch and then rolls forward. The motor purrs. Red's hand stays on top of his and Red says, 'Okay a little faster' after the car rolls through a few empty parking spaces.

Eventually as the car works its way around the empty lot in slow sweeping circles, the sound of the motor climbs. Red's fingers tighten over the back of Fletcher's hand on the gear shift. Fletcher knows he should be driving with two hands when he's not shifting, but Red never does - drives with his knees sometimes, which is ridiculously dangerous and incredibly against the law - and the parking lot is so deserted he finds he can't even muster the energy to be worried.

Red says, 'Clutch in' and once that's done he guides Fletcher's hand: shifts up into second gear. When Fletcher doesn't immediately pedal up into gear he squeezes Fletcher's hand. 'Clutch out, gas in,' he reminds him.

'Right.' Fletcher works the pedals. The car's engine rpm ramps wickedly - 'Less clutch!' Red howls - and then it settles into second gear.

They spend maybe twenty minutes running the car through it's paces. Red forces him to go to a full stop a few times just to put him through the torture of getting rolling again. It's the hardest part and he hardly improves at all, but there's a subtle difference between Red teaching him and Fletcher's dad teaching him - namely that he doesn't feel like a complete failure when Red yells at him. He is allowed to shout back without feeling guilty, to punch Red in the arm (though he is bad at punching anything it it hurts his knuckles to do it) when he gets too pushy. He shouts at his dad too, but that's different. That's being sixteen and hormonal, which he usually only recognizes after the fact and not when the urge to yell is clawing at him.

By the time Red tells him to stop the car, his arm aches from using the gear shift and his leg holding in the clutch is shaking. Fletcher puts the car in neutral and puts on the parking brake in anticipation of swapping seats - that, at least, he has gotten very good at. He has swapped seats so many times he's lost count.

'That was terrible,' Red says, but without much conviction. He says it like 'That was a terrible start' and not like 'that was terrible lets never ever do that again.'

'I know.'

'Awful. You are going to be ninety before you get your learners license.' Red slides his fingers from Fletcher's hand and up to his wrist, thumb pressed against the line of his forearm.

'I know.' That much is a legitimate groan of horror. They are breaking the law doing this. He has absolutely no right to be behind the wheel of a car.

'I drove for a year before I got mine.' It's conversational, easy. The engine is running still and Red's hand slides up to the crook of Fletcher's elbow. 'Makes the test easier.'

'If ASI ever requires licensing for detective work you'll be in trouble with a record like that,' Fletcher tells him without any real heat.

Red reaches over and turns the key in the ignition. He kills the engine. 'I never got caught.'

Fletcher doesn't think he actually drove for a year before getting his permit and certainly not on the roads - probably like this: looping around empty back parking lots on a Sunday when no one in Lock is doing anything important and they certainly aren't around to see two teenage boys breaking driving laws or feeling each other up in the front seat after.


End file.
